AKIPTAN
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Eligibility for Akiptan services are reserved for:
Any individual or entity engaged in agriculture and food systems, including but not limited to: growing, processing, distributing, or selling food or food products with a goal of improving the Indian use of Indian resources within the service area. All applicants must be actively involved in the day to day labor and management decisions of the operation unless they are temporarily uninvolved due to pursuing further education or other extenuating circumstances to be determined by the Loan Committee.
What do you consider agriculture?
When many people think of agriculture the first thing that comes to mind are farming and ranching, but we go beyond that. We define agriculture very broadly. For example we finance cattle and other livestock operations, farms, fisheries, greenhouses, etc. Akiptan does operating loans as well as ownership loans.
How do I get started? How do I apply?
To apply, we invite you to complete our online intake form here. Once that is completed our Loan Administrator will reach out to you with next steps. The Intake Form helps to Akiptan get to know you. You may also contact us by phone or email to ask any questions.
What does the loan process include?
The loan process begins with discovery and intake to get to know the client. Then you move into technical assistance and application completion, review and closing, then aftercare. Learn more about Akiptan in this webinar recording.
What is this "Interest Only Option" I keep hearing about?
Akiptan does regular term loans, but we also have what we like to call our "Interest Only Option." This option resembles a loan with an interest only repayment period. The smaller, interest only payments allow for the operation to have upfront capacity growth and for profits to be reinvested back into the operation. This puts operations on a path to success and easy principal repayment after the interest only payments. Check out this blog that explains the Investment Option in more detail HERE.
What are your Loan Limits?
Akiptan's current Loan Limits are $250,000, but we are working on raising that limit.
What is the timeline like?
While Akiptan does its best to handle everything in a timely manner, this is not an immediate thing. The part of the process that typically takes the longest is the gathering information/application process. This is dependent on the client's ability to get the staff the information and forms that they need. This can take anywhere from a couple days to a couple weeks. After the staff has all of the information that they need, they put together a loan narrative to send to the Loan Committee for review. The review process can take a week or two, depending on the loan activity. If there are a lot of unanswered questions, it may take longer. It is best to put in an application as soon as possible, but having a couple of months time is preferable. The less rushed the application is the better. If your loan is approved, we can hold the money until you are ready to use it, which helps save on interest as well.